He, after a slight bow to the stranger, directed his steps towards the bed in which Marianne lay watching his advance with an unfamiliar feeling of breathlessness. With his clear eyes, tanned face and energetic movements, Jason seemed to bring the whole wide ocean with him into the sea-green bedchamber.
To Marianne, he seemed to have swept away the four walls of the room and let the sea air blow in in great, sweeping gusts, yet in reality he had done nothing. He had only strolled across the room and bowed and uttered some polite expressions of satisfaction at finding her sufficiently recovered to receive him. Overcoming her feelings with an effort, she managed to force herself to answer audibly:
'I have been wishing to thank you for saving me,' she whispered, in what she hoped was an ordinary, conversational tone. 'But for you, I do not know what might have happened—'
'Well, I do,' Jason retorted coolly. 'You would have been like Madame de Schwartzenburg and the Princess de la Leyen and a good many more. Just what, may I ask, did you think you were after to that inferno? Not the Emperor, at all events. He was in the garden, helping the rescue work.'
'Is there no one but the Emperor I might have been seeking in the fire? In fact, it was something else, I think.'
'Someone dear to you, I imagine. A member of your new husband's family, perhaps? Which reminds me' – a tiny smile twisted one corner of his mouth although his blue eyes remained unwarmed – 'which reminds me, you must tell me all about this marriage. So unexpected, was it not? Where did you dig up the impressive name and title? Another present from the Emperor? He has certainly been generous this time, though scarcely more than you deserve. It suits you better to be a princess than a singer.'
The Emperor had nothing to do with it! My marriage was arranged by my family. You may remember my godfather, the Abbé de Chazay, from Selton, he—'
'What? So this time it was he who found you your new name? You know, you are quite the most astonishing woman of my acquaintance. I never know who you will be the next time I meet you…'
He paused and glanced significantly at Fortunée. She, her curiosity satisfied, and probably thinking that the conversation seemed to be taking a strange turn, judged it advisable to withdraw. She rose and moved with dignity towards the door. Marianne made a move to restrain her, then changed her mind. If Jason meant to be disagreeable, she preferred to face him alone. Fortunée must have realized, in any case, that in trying to present Marianne to advantage, she had been wasting her time. Jason observed her departure with one eyebrow raised, then turned back to Marianne with a saturnine grin:
'Charming woman. Now, what was I saying… Ah, yes, that one never knows what name you will be using next. I met you as Mademoiselle d'Asselnat, then, almost immediately, you became Lady Cranmere. The next time we met, in the Prince of Benevento's house, you were Mademoiselle Mallerousse. Not for long, though. The moment my back was turned, a wave of the imperial wand and you were transformed into that ravishing Italian singer called, what was her name? Maria Stella? Now, you are still Italian, am I right? Only you have become a princess, a – what was it you called yourself? Serene Highness, wasn't it? It's not easy for an American citizen like me to understand these things…'
Marianne listened with incredulity to this flow of calculated insult, delivered in a cordial, conversational tone, and asked herself what devious ends her visitor was pursuing. Was he mocking her, or was he trying to show her that the warmth of friendship which had developed in the underground caves of Chaillot had changed into a quiet, amiable contempt? If that was it, she thought she could not bear it, but she had to know. Turning her head wearily on the lace pillow, Marianne closed her eyes and sighed:
'I was told that you had called to inquire of me every morning since the ball and, in my innocence, I thought this a sign of friendship. I see that I was mistaken. You merely wished to assure yourself that I should soon be in a fit state to endure the shafts of your sarcasm. I am afraid you will have to excuse me. Unfortunately, I am not yet sufficiently restored to fight you on equal terms…'
There was a short silence. To Marianne, behind her closed eyelids, it seemed to go on for ever. For a moment, she thought that he had gone, and she was on the point of opening her eyes anxiously to see when she heard him laughing. She swung her head round instantly, eyes blazing with indignation:
'You can laugh?'
'I'll say I can! You are a truly remarkable actress, Marianne. You nearly took me in for a moment. But one look at the gleam in your eyes is enough to give you away.'
'But it's true. Baron Corvisart—'
'Has just left. I know. I met him. He told me you were very weak, certainly, but I know now that your weakness is only physical. Praise God, your spirit is unharmed and that was all I wanted to know. Forgive me. I was only trying to get a reaction out of you. Since that night, I have been living with the fear that it might no longer be possible.'
'But why?'
'Because,' he said seriously, 'the woman I saw at the ball and during the fire was not the woman I had known. She was cold, distant, there was nothing in her eyes. It was the look of a woman who goes seeking death. You had everything a human being could ask for: wealth, beauty, honours, the love of a great man – and you were going to have a child. And yet you wanted to die a dreadful death. Why, Marianne?'
A rush of warmth pervaded her whole being, reawakening the nerve centres which had been numbed by despair and physical suffering. So his cruelty and indifference had been a pose? Seeing him there, beside her, with that drawn look on his face which betrayed how deeply he felt, she felt a sudden, keener awareness of her love for him. The feeling was so strong that for an instant she had a wild impulse to tell him the truth, tell him that it was grief at the thought that she had lost him which had made her want to die. She was on the point of confessing at that moment how much she loved him and how wonderful her love seemed to her, but she recollected herself just in time. The man before her was a married man. He no longer possessed the right, or even the will perhaps, to listen to a declaration of her love. What had brought him here was simply friendship. And Marianne was fundamentally too honest not to respect the marriages of others, even if her own experience had proved doubly disastrous.
Even so, she summoned up the courage to smile, unaware that her smile was more heartbreaking than tears, and as he repeated 'Why?', she answered at last: 'Perhaps because of all those very things, or because most of it is only a snare and a delusion. The Emperor is married, Jason, and happy in his marriage… I am nothing to him now beyond a loving and devoted friend. I believe he loves his wife. For my part—'
'You still love him, do you?'
'I – am fond of him, more than that, I admire him with all my heart.'
'But the child? Was the child too a snare and a delusion?'
'No. It was the one tie which bound us together irrevocably. Perhaps, after all, it is better so, for him at any rate. For me, it complicates matters considerably… Prince Sant'Anna—' Marianne broke off suddenly and said impatiently: 'But if you have been coming here every day, you must have seen Arcadius?'
'Of course.'
'Then do not tell me he has told you nothing? Surely he has told you all about my marriage.'